


Good Answer, Boy

by casey270



Series: Halloween [2]
Category: Adam Lambert (Musician), Ashley Dzerigian (Musician), Tommy Ratliff (Musician)
Genre: Gen, Halloween
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-08
Updated: 2013-10-08
Packaged: 2017-12-28 20:22:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/996171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/casey270/pseuds/casey270
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ashley gives Tommy a new kind of costume</p>
            </blockquote>





	Good Answer, Boy

**Author's Note:**

> for the [Glam 100](http://glam-100.livejournal.com/) prompt - Feathers and Fur

It’s the second time today Ashley’s walked past him, asking the same thing. It happened three times yesterday and four the day before that. It’s a simple question, but Tommy has no fucking clue what it means or what his answer should be. 

The three words are enunciated in the precise way Ashley treats all her words. Tommy hears them perfectly, even though he asks her to repeat them every time. So far she’s refused, but he expects that. 

She does tell him that he’ll understand when he understands. Then those same three secret, mystic words come at him again.

~*~

“Feathers or fur?” she asks as she walks past, letting her finger trail across his chest. He’s not sure if the words cause the tremor he feels working through his body, or if it’s the touch that does it.

He knows he has the key to open the riddle of the question. He’s not sure where to find it though. It’s on the tip of his tongue, at the edge of his thoughts. He closes his eyes and says the first word that fights its way out. 

“Both.”

“Good answer, boy.” 

He looks into Ashley’s smile, and the world darkens.

~*~

The light comes back little by little, and so do the changes. There’s a burning itch just below his skin, a sting that runs through his body. Muscles and bones ache and break, regenerating with power and strength.

He looks down to see his limbs reforming, thicker, mighty in ways he’s never been before. His eyes are sharp and quick, picking out individual hairs poking out, covering him in a thick pelt of protection. 

He feels thousand of tiny pricks and turns his head to watch as feathers and wings grow from his back to stretch and flex in glory.

~*~

He moves on four feet, his wings extending, ready to take flight. One leap off the cliff that shouldn’t be there, and he’s airborne, soaring over a land he’s never seen before. He doesn’t think anyone’s ever seen it before, not any human, anyway, but it doesn’t matter, because it’s his for the night.

He scans the horizon, missing nothing, drinking it in with senses sharper than he ever knew possible. He enjoys a newfound sense of confidence, knowing he can hunt and strike if his desire pulls him in that direction.

He’s the ruler of his own private domain.

~*~

There are others here with him, riding the currents with wings as bright as the sun or prowling with muscles coiled and ready to spring. He’s marked with the singularity of having both, born of his refusal to make a choice. There’s a strange familiarity in some of the others, and he thinks he might recognize them if he tried, but that would take time and thought, both of which he’s not willing to give up.

He moves with grace he never possessed before as he rides through the nights and days without measure. Time travels its own path here.

~*~

He pushes his body to the edge of its limits, coming to rest beside a mountain stream. He only means to close his eyes for a minute, to catch his breath before another run through the air.

But when he opens his eyes he’s Tommy again, standing in front of a smiling Ashley. He feels the muscles in his back twitch, trying to move mighty wings one more time, but they’re gone, like they were never even there at all. 

Ashley winks, telling him, “Never let anyone make you pick one or the other when you’re meant to be both.”


End file.
